We are in a faction-less storehouse or warehouse for all it matters, and the faction-less, who are supposedly isolated, and without community, are together inside it.
Together, like a faction.
They don't fight one another or avoid one another. I had assumed they would be similar to the scavengers I come across on the borders of factions.
One or two here and there, a small group, maybe a handful or so. Nothing like this. I know what I expected of them and I was prepared to be wrong, but I am still surprised.
More than surprised. Maybe, a little mortified.
An alarming number of people sit, huddled together, next to rolls of bedding or makeshift housing, prying open cans of food, sipping from bottles or pails of melting snow, warming themselves at controlled bonfires.
I can hear their conversations and even laughter permeating the chill air. Conversations which topics I can't begin to imagine.
What have they to converse about?
There is an unpleasant scent. Stale body odor possibly, and the musty warehouse mixed in with the cooking of food and the burning of wood and garbage.
But, what is the most alarming to me is the sight of children, weaving between the groups of adults and lean-tos, not confined to a particular color of clothing.
Faction-less children.
I find myself searching for one in particular but am jostled by my captors. The barrel of a gun against my spine.
My renewed calm gives way to a deep silence inside and I clench my fists with bloodless knuckles as Kirk shoves me forward down the hall.
"This is what I wanted you to see." Kirk says. "Doesn't look like much yet, does it?"
There are recognizable emotions like pity, and rage but, mainly exhaustion. I'm finding it hard to muster that which I have had very little of for anything, especially for faction-less even given my circumstances but, Abnegation… That is a different issue altogether.
One that I find myself reluctant to acknowledge.
Abnegation have strict rules, they control the government, they're required to uphold our system, with their faction specific procedures on handling of faction-less and to-be faction-less to prevent such an occurrence.
Why have they let this happen? How are there faction-less children and why would they be left here?
Why too did their leaders lie about and cover up the death of Marcus' wife?
"You cling to your ideals and all the comfortable teachings you grew up with, that the system is perfect, that everyone is doing their part, but Abnegation is many things, selfless, is not one of them." Evelyn says, she crosses her arms and stares me down. "They hide secrets, they lie, they act for selfish gain. The power that was given to them, in the belief that they-"
"Abnegation is the only faction with the initiative to aid you, Dauntless repress you to the point of hunting you, and make examples out of those deaths. Erudite and Candor pretend you don't even exist. As for Amity passed the walls, faction-less basically don't exist-You can't expect me to believe you want another faction in charge of the government."
"Not with the way they are now, no." Kirk admits with a complacent shrug before jerking his head towards a door. "But you assume the factions can't change. Look around, they have to and they will. It's inevitable. We've been assured that Dauntless can do that."
Two armed faction-less enter unannounced, and both take seats at the rectangular table but no one else bats an eyelash in their direction.
One is a young male with short black hair and the other is a female but her features are severe, her hair is shorter than the males, cut close to her scalp and she has a lazy eye.
"How is it to be effected?" I ask, turning to Evelyn, ignoring the audience.
What could the faction-less even do about it? I'm still not finding their force to be overly impressive and anything I've learned of them only furthers my confusion.
Falen would only need them for the purpose of hiding divergent. Why arm them?
"Jeanine Matthews." Kirk answers in her stead, clasping his hands in front of him the barest hint of a smile twitches at the tip of his lips and Evelyn simply nods.
I scoff, unable to hold back my utter disbelief. For a perverse moment, I think they are joking and then I realize, they are not.
Jeanine is already making her moves against Abnegation, with the intention of overthrowing the government and placing Erudite in power.
Max and Eric want Dauntless in power, at least that's what I still believe of them. But, even I know that would not bode well for the faction-less, not at all, so, their alternative ?
Falen.
At least, with whatever "change" he promised, to make the option of his Dauntless government seem more appealing to them.
They want to ride Jeanine's coattails, possibly help her along through their connection to Abnegation, what with Evelyn having been the wife of an Abnegation leader & councilman and to now, their connection to Dauntless and they must also have a connection to. . .
"Jeanine knows how to effectively use knowledge as artillery, and so do we." Evelyn says, putting word to my thoughts. "We can get the information through our connection to Abnegation, to her, through… Different, inconspicuous means and she can wield it against them."
Falen clears his throat and captures my attention. "I hope that you, as a reasonable individual, can see that we both have something to gain from being in a mutually cooperative… Partnership, aside from that of the one I've established with the faction-less."
"How so?" I ask flatly. My nails tap and scrape the armrest of the wooden chair, catching splinters that dig into my skin.
It's not everyday someone holds me at gun point and then goes out of their way to appeal to my 'better interests'. When they've had so many opportunities to kill me
I'm reminded of the phrase; the enemy of my enemy is my ally. But I wonder now, at all my enemies.
They need not convince me, I didn't let them bring me here for nothing. Despite everything, I came willingly. Perhaps their 'courtesy' is in light of that, if they even recognize my courtesy as well.
Falen places his elbows on the table, and twists his fingers together. "This could be the change you've been waiting for." He says lowly. "These are violent times, cruel times, and I know that no one detests it more than you."
It's as if he's read off some psychoanalysis that Eric made in a report to him that explains some mundane aspect of my life, or my habits and hesitations.
I feel the violence rising like hot bile up my throat and I scoff, shifting in my chair to sit upright and rigid.
Cruel and violent times? We are the ones who made them so. The thought pulls me into another tangent.
I want to ask Falen. If he used his son to buy his way here. Let him run rampant through faction-less. To make it seem they are dangerous enough to accuse Abnegation of neglect. Make the faction-less desperate enough, then make a deal with them and take that twin out, give them guns so he can point them at Abnegation, or whomever he desires.
Maybe it was not a vote made by a father in the attempt to save a son. Just an elaborate plot.
Then there's Evelyn whom I'd ask of Four. Tobias. Her son. Left alone to face what she was too weak to. Thinking his mother was dead for years. Had she gone to see him? Would he be 'happy' to see her? Having gotten over her death, only to find that she had not died, simply, ran away and left him alone all those years. To suffer.
I am no more virtuous than them, and I realize, though I would ask to elicit a rise out of them, I care not for their honest response, or in how they would defend themselves, I'm not even curious of it.
I assume that is why they thought to include me, assuming that I too would also entertain that basest sentimentality, that somehow, we could be anything other than what we are, that we could change.
If we choose it. Maybe.
I don't ask and I know nothing about Kirk, save for the fact that he seems to assume authority over everything, even over seniority that Evelyn would have and the power that Falen has.
He must be something to these faction-less, or maybe the tool Evelyn and Falen would use.
I can't deny, we are individuals to which the end of something justifies the means of achieving it, this allows us to communicate, our similar natures.
Allows us to sit in such mutual company. The end of violent and cruel times, well, that may be achieved by the end of us.
I lean back. "What will be done about the current leaders?"
"Off the top of my head, I'd say only a few will need to be replaced, but once Dauntless is head of the government the other factions will more than likely accept without argument even Jeanine." Evelyn says but her tone would make it seem that she is glad I asked.
It shows that I am at least interested. If not, considering.
"Despite what you think." She says smoothly tilting her head to the side, her eyes are black pits and I see the vein in her neck. "We'd like to accomplish this with as little unnecessary death as possible."
"Then you do not deny that there is necessary death?" I ask petulantly.
She sighs heavily as though dealing with a child, I'm reminded of when Eric had said I'm insatiable. I realize then what I would seem like to them as well.
But it is because of Eric that I had asked.
"Nature is unsentimental, death is built in. People will die." Falen replies solemnly. "As they always do."
Though his response was expected, I feel somewhat able to acquiesce due to the honesty.
"Tell me, then, why am I alive?" I ask, my jaw tensed. The final thing that I am still unable to gather completely, the why bother with me in all of this.
Falen stands, motioning for the others to remain seated. His eyes do not meet mine and he turns as if giving himself the moment to deliberate what to say without being under my gaze.
"Technically we don't even need you." interrupts the lazy eyed faction-less, calling attention to her presence in the room. "We have a deal with an Erudite. We house whoever he sends our way and he cooperates with us."
I frown but now I understand why they haven't just killed me yet. They can't, though they might rather.
The realization sits strangely but I'd noticed they looked displeased and mistrusting, still reluctant. I assumed it was simply because of Dauntless' reputation in regards to them. Of my reputation as well.
But I now know it is because they are at an impasse, this is why they are trying to convince me, appeal to me. It's because they cannot kill me without risking some fallout with someone close to Jeanine.
They cannot risk loosing their connection to Erudite.
Then Falen had possibly meant to kill me all along. His hand was only stayed because of-
"Garrett is important, because of his connection and standing within Erudite. You have somehow become… Ancillary to that end." Kirk explains but he gives the lazy eyed girl a disproving look. Perhaps I wasn't meant to know this detail. "We've had some… Disagreements regarding how to approach the issue of your involvement-"
"We only need one person to keep that Erudite's balls in a vice and guess what? We have two." The faction-less boy says. "And right now you-"
"Are more accessible than Garrett is." Evelyn interrupts, as though that is the deciding factor, the end and answer to the argument, it is definitely not the direction that the faction-less boy was headed.
Falen still does not speak. He does not look me in the eyes, doesn't even turn back around to face me.
I settle and cross my arms, tapping my fingers along my elbows and wait, though I suddenly realize they're waiting for me to say something.
I gesture for them to continue, this new information continues to churn around in my head and gut, I've nothing to say on it. Not to them.
"We've built ourselves a little haven here." Kirk explains as if trying to lessen the tension or possibly explain the hostility. "We do our best to protect what and who we've got here from other Faction-less and-"
"The likes of you." The faction-less boy adds. "And every other Dauntless mutt."
Kirk motions for the two other Faction-less to leave the room, clearly displeased with them, they stand, throwing me looks of animosity, of which I am not unused to and I only return their looks with disinterest.
There is a brief silence after the door is shut to their departure and I wonder why they were even present to begin with. Possibly for them to familiarize themselves with my appearance? See my face?
"Now that you've shown interest in Erudite, Jeanine will want you to choose Erudite." Falen says, the conversation picking back up on a note that I was unprepared for, he finally turns around and I see. . . Remorse, pain in his eyes. "You're in an advantageous position in terms of her favor because of how you could potentially benefit her and her research…Thus why they've been focusing on you, and will potentially continue to focus on you."
I'd argue if he weren't right, instead I feel myself nod in agreement. He made me into a distraction and put me in a position of advantage to them. I'd helped it along myself.
I know Eric is working with Erudite, with Max and Jeanine. Had all this time. Falen must have known as well.
"I know Coulter implored you to report back to him, and you will."
My throat becomes tight.
"The information I provided for you previously should give you some direction to how this will go." Falen says and he is about to continue when I interrupt him.
I cannot be one of their 'inconspicuous' means of delivering information, even the little supplanted evidence was already under scrutiny and question not to mention was just misdirection.
Eric is too clever and perceptive. He will be furious.
"You do not have enough to endow me for those services." I say, with an edge to my tone. "Garrett may have made terms but I'm not inclined to follow by them. I cannot-"
I shake my head thinking of the way Eric studies me. I can almost feel his severe gaze on me now. His hands on me. What I'm about to say gets caught in my throat.
I can't do it.
They obviously don't know Eric like I do and when it comes to him, it would seem far easier to kill him than to fool him. But it seems that is not an option.
Not part of their design just yet.
I swallow thickly, unable and unwilling to admit to them what Eric is aloud.
They look as though they would argue with me but, for me to remain neutral and impassive would be in their best interests. As well as mine.
"If I'm in an advantageous position with Jeanine and Erudite then the opposite could be said as well, any more suspicious behaviors on my part would call attention." I say instead smoothing my features in case they betrayed me.
Evelyn looks pleased. Maybe she never wanted me to get involved, maybe I had it wrong, maybe Falen was supposed to kill me and it wasn't his choice.
Falen taps his fingers along the table, his expression thoughtful but still pained. "We'll be having a conference this evening, which will render their investigations and allegations against me void and Eric will have no choice but to desist and find a new route, in which case he will implore you to-"
"I've just violated curfew." I remind, not lost to the fact that he knew on some level my hesitations concerning Eric. He caused more tension intentionally.
His control and level of manipulation effortless. Eric and I could barely hold a candle to it, we are no competition.
Falen's expression changes with the barest hint of humor, catching on immediately. It was another weak attempt to dissuade him.
Kirk clears his throat. "30 minutes."
Falen nods and checks his watch. "I need a moment with her, alone." He says, waving to them dismissively.
Evelyn and Kirk both give him a nod and move to leave the room, but I can tell they will be listening intently right outside the door.
He doesnt speak right away, just clasps his hands in front of him, his sullen gaze never leaving mine.
This moment is for me.
"How did you do it?" I ask, unable to help myself. I clutch my wound when I imagine I feel it throb. There is pain and discomfort. He would know exactly what I ask.
"I did nothing." He answers simply. "She jumped."
I swallow, my throat is dry, my wound is felt even greater than before. "Then you-"
"I did nothing. It was assumed you pushed her." Falen says. "I know Max, and I know Jeanine. I even know Eric what surprised me, what I could not have planned for was you, how you would effect things."
"You don't know Eric." I argue, meaning to warn him. "He is working with Max, and Jeanine. If you let him live he will-"
"I do." He says solemnly holding his hand up to stop me. "Eric is not a concern. Killing him prematurely will only rouse suspicion and cause Jeanine to supplant another. Eric is easily manipulated, even Max agrees. They already have a strenuous relationship, and he would prefer Dauntless rule. Trust me."
"Why should I trust you?" I almost stand, I can feel the questions swarm my head all at once. Fighting for the need to be answered. For my ravenous curiosity to be satisfied. The doubts. The need to understand.
My thoughts already trying to calculate what he just said, all the possible outcomes, and then another thought invading, how she must have trusted him. The thought arises like bile in my throat but so too does the answer.
It was not Falen that let her die, but me. I was given a choice then. How many times was I given a choice.
This is exactly the reason why the illusion of choice is dangerous, why aptitudes are absolute and it is made easy. So no one makes the mistake of chosing wrong.
"Open your eyes Genesis." He says, calmly. "We want the same thing, we are weary, all of us. We want to lay it down, to give up what has become too heavy to bear. Some of us, cannot put it down. Some of us just can't find the way to, this is the way."
I feel the weight on me then, and I don't deny it. How many times had I felt it? When had that desire, plant itself?
They all want it, all of them, of course they do. I've seen it in Max, in how he drinks, how he smokes. I've seen it in Garrett already, in his voice, how he moves. I've seen it in Jeanine, in her eyes and how she does not relent in her work, how it consumes her.
It must lie, even in Eric. That desire.
The end to the never ending, their means of achieving it is just different. They would do whatever it takes. That was the point, the reason. That someday it would end.
That was our purpose. My purpose. It was always for a reason that we endured. We endured.
But does Falen really mean to bring that about?
I must take too long in my musings, because he checks his watch. I open and close my mouth.
"Genesis." Tilting his head, he places a piece of paper for me at the edge of the desk and exits without another word.
I'm able to grab it before Kirk and Evelyn re-enter, with expressions that betray nothing of having listened to our short conversation. They notice me standing.
"Come." Kirk says grabbing me by the arm and forcing me towards him. Evelyn follows as he pulls me to the far end of the room. "I'll leave her to you. But I'll be right outside if she tries anything."
Evelyn nod's before tossing the clothing I had gotten from Gav over a partition. I move around it to begin changing.
His clothing smells like cigarettes and spice. A welcome scent in comparison.
She begins explaining a method of communication using faction-less codes on billboards, colors, numbers. I would be impressed if it werent so elementary in comparison to everything I learned tonight, and the things I can still only guess at.
"Besides that, every message given to a faction-less will make its way to me." She says as I button and belt my pants. I see her eye my bandage that is flashed as I hold it above my waist.
I would wonder why messages wouldn't be taken directly to Kirk, who seems to be in charge but I don't ask, instead I smooth my hair down into a tight pony tail before walking around the partition with my old clothing and Evelyn wraps a bony hand around my wrist as I begin shrugging the jacket on, remembering to retrieve my tablet and the note out of the previous one.
"There is something else…"
When I step into my apartment and flick the light on it's as though everything sharpens into focus and the air is suddenly alive with the sound of emptiness.
Then it hits me with full force: Conversations from last night and this morning spin around me in the silence, piercing against my skin and boring into my skull.
I press my palms into my eyes and bend over, a wave of nausea rising in my throat so I cover my mouth with my arm and slowly exhale.
Pain throbs across my abdomen deep, and I feel it as if fingers like veins were reaching into the wound, weaving and wriggling its way in to tear at my insides.
The tablet in my hand still showing the hall outside my room. I leave it on the table and head to the bathroom.
But I stop. The door is ajar, the light inside is on. I push it lightly and it swings open.
I stare at Jade as she sits limply against the wall near the toilet, between it and the shower, barely bothering to look up. Her head rolls on her shoulders, her hands slack in her lap.
She looks up at me, her eyes hollow and unfocused. She raises a hand as if reaching out and that's when I see the blood trailing down her wrist and dripping from her fingers. It comes to me like the hollow echo of drips in a tunnel, though there is no sound.
I feel as if I've somehow woken up in the middle of the night in a strange place and can't orient myself, the shock pushing in like thick darkness. Unfamiliar, slow and un-moving, time becomes suspended in my breaths.
Her lips waver a bit before trembling around the edges. "Gene." she says, her voice soft, weak.
My name tears me from the trance; I shake my head and slide to her on the ground, shrugging out of my jacket and I grab her cheeks, forcing her to look at me. Her eyelids flutter before drooping closed, and I force them open to check her pupils.
The cut on her forearm is jagged, wide and raw. It's begun to clot, the blood thick and pooling on the flat gray tile around her, my knees smearing streaks near her thighs. Her pulse is a flutter, as if only accelerated, awakened, by my presence.
She murmurs, her lips barely moving, I don't catch what she says and I don't try to.
I look at all the blood, staining my skin, squeezing her wrists tighter in my fingers.
Max and Falen leave the infirmary together after conducting a routine questioning. Most of which Jade spent telling them that I had not hurt her.
If they didn't already know of my alibi, I would not have been in the room. Normal procedure would be to question her without influence. In case she would lie for fear of retaliation from her attacker.
I can smell her blood on my hands, feel it drying and cracking on my skin and under my nails. It's like a metallic sheen on the back of my tongue and I can taste it.
My voice is caught somewhere in my throat but I would not know what to say with it. How to use it.
"You went to faction-less." Jade says. It comes as a statement, not a question. "But, you came back…"
I look at her carefully, wondering how she would even know, or come to that. What she is thinking. What she was thinking. My blood hums with anger.
I can't figure out what emotion's are in her voice, but her fingers clutch the white sheets at her sides. Her arm bandaged, an IV protruding from the back of her hand.
She rolls her head over the pillow until she's facing me. Her expression is somber and serious but her eyes glassy.
"Do you hate me?" Her voice breaks and her lip quivers. Immediately I open my mouth to tell her no but I swallow it down and allow myself this contemplation.
I could not, but I can find no pity either, or any opposite emotion. For, is it not the weak that I have become this way? Cold, hard and hollow.
This malignancy has grown from the inside. This malevolent belief that they need me to be this, that I am what I am for them, that I did all I've done for them. That I would endure for them, what they could not.
My breath comes out slow and steady, each inhalation is like ice, it's sharpness stinging my lungs and I turn my face away to stare at the cracks that spider web across the ground so that she may not see my distress.
"I'm sorry, okay?" She says exasperatedly.
An apology, it twists my gut, spoiling each swallow I take.
She breathes in deep, her fingers tightening around the edge of her sheet till her knuckles glow white. "I'm sorry I had such an easy life growing up when you didn't."
I'm about to interrupt her, tell her not to apologize for such a thing, a thing she has no idea of, couldn't possibly grasp what I had endured but she shakes her head.
"I'm sorry I'm not like you or Kat, I'm sorry that you guys can't-Couldn't rely on me, or confide in me because I'm. . .weak… I'm sorry that… I'm sorry that you want to leave too… I'm sorry that I-That I need you, and I don't want you to be faction-less, that I can't bear if you left me too. I love you, you're my best friend."
Her words are so infused with emotion that I cross my arms over my chest at the naked, selfish, vulnerability of it. It twists and scrapes inside me to the point of discomfort.
"I can't do this without you. . .I want to mean something to you." She lowers her eyes as if she's afraid of how I'll respond. "Enough for you to stay…."
I check the corners of the rooms for cameras then, spurred by the urgency to give her a purpose or understanding and I take my tablet out, holding my hand up to her to wait for a moment, a few monents while I check the feeds skipping through rotations.
"Katherine is not faction-less." I tell her once satisfied when the infirmary does not appear among them or in the isolated archives being recorded.
My muscles are so exhausted they shake, trying to wring out what little warmth they can.
"What do you -" Jade looks at me, becoming silent.
"She did not leave by choice."
"But her note. . ." She argues. "We read it, it was her handwriting, we-"
"It was staged, she'd meant to escape before initiations. What do you know about Divergent." The word comes out with more disdain than I had meant and I remind myself it is not that way anymore.
That internal struggle despite my strides against my nature still pulls me in one way. I'd been so conditioned.
I push the conversation forward unsure how much time I have before Eric discovers I've returned. If he wasn't already lying in wait.
Max and Falen both gave me looks of disappointment and I know little of what consequences I'm to face for breaking curfew. Of what Falen intends to play it out as.
Of what excuse I might have to come up with to pacify or appease Eric.
"I've never heard of it before. . ." She says, her eyes becoming concerned, questioning but thoughtful. "Well maybe, but I thought it was make believe. Was she. . .Are you?"
"When you went through your fear simulations, who did you tell. Who knew?" I ignore her question, my fingers clutch the tablet though I've deleted the footage.
Her eyes widen when she accepts my silent implication, my unspoken lie, and she makes a connection to the event.
Who knew besides Four.
Who else had seen them? Who did they tell afterwards?
Their fear sims were not recorded, the console had been damaged, the data was erased, I believe that to be Four's doing. That must be why he asked me about her at all.
Yet someone still knew Katherine was a Divergent. He could have suspected it was me.
"I don't know." She says shaking her head, her brows crease in frustration trying to remember or recall the memory. "We we're drinking, it was just for shits and we didn't know -"
"Who did you tell?" I ask again.
"We didn't tell anyone, I swear." She insists. "We didnt want to get caught cheating on initiation before we even chose. We all made a pact not to tell even you because we knew how you'd get."
"Don't tell anyone anyone about our conversation." I warn her. "Don't ever repeat the word I said and we can never speak of this again. I am being watched."
I place the tablet next to her on the bed and unzip my jacket to pull my shirt up, exposing the bandage that is blossomed with blackness, with slightly yellowed edges.
The pain becomes worse, and I can feel my body weakening as if being pulled out by the fingered veins that had embedded within it.
"What happened to you?" She gasps, her bandaged arm raises as her hand reaches for me. I throw my shirt back down and glance at the door.
Her eyes become hard as she recognizes the danger, the warning, the risk, and consequence.
"I swear." She crosses her heart with a pointed finger before placing a fist to her chest.
She was never one I feared could not keep a secret. Though I'm not being completely honest with her, I felt though I understood what she had gathered from our conversation.
I can pretend to be a Divergent. I can give her a reason.
I feel relief. It is fleeting and only so brief that its absence is felt more harshly when I am reminded what awaits. My hands clench at my sides and my jaw tightens.
After a moment she reaches for me, I sigh and take her hand in mine. She squeezes my fingers, still crusted with her blood and I realize how her skin feels cold, even to me.
"I have work to attend to, I'll come check back in several hours…" I start preparing myself. Her eyes widen and she squeezes tighter unwilling to release me.
"Eric, was the one who told me you left. . ." She admits, her brows turning up and furrowing once more. "Is he. . .?"
I scowl and she winces, I had squeezed her hand too tightly in my own. I loosen my grip on her immediately, and then soften my features. "Do not ever trust his intentions, ever, this is the most important thing, Jade. Do not let him use me, or anyone, or anything against you."
She nods vigorously. "Is he the one watching you?" She asks with a whisper as if suddenly worried someone would hear us, that he could hear us. "Is he the one who hurt you?"
I cast my gaze away to the cracks in the concrete once more. They are small, but numerous, spread apart, some connecting but not enough to destroy the foundation.
Eric had not hurt me. Though he may try.
He had only called attention to the cracks that had begun forming in me. The pain that was already present.
Change is inevitable, even he had seen it, felt it. Evelyn, Kirk, Falen, Max, and even Jeanine elicit it. Drive it.
They have each found their means to achieving the end to the never ending, their way to put down what has become to heavy to bear. Or they believe they have.
Nothing will stop them, or get in their way.
"Yes." I tell her, squeezing her fingers between mine, softer. I swallow thickly. "He is."
"You violated the curfew already, after we just fucking amended your probation, Gene." Max says, tiredly. He leans forward and drums his fingers against his desk. "But… You did so with justified reasoning, and it's mainly our fault for not briefing you on Falen's investigation into Faction-less activity… Therefore-"
"We'll be lenient, after all it's understandable that you should be alerted by suspicious activities and feel the need to act on behalf of your faction and it's safety." Jeanine finishes, there is a sort of respect in her voice and I wonder if it is because she knows Eric encouraged it.
Their relationship is strenuous, because of me.
What she says makes my heart pound slower, as if my blood's become too thick to move through my veins.
Sharp words sit on the edge of my tongue, though not as sharp as my teeth in it. Such a day this turned out to be.
I can imagine what information Falen would be able to divulge to Jeanine to encourage her, and already her anticipation to learn it, and use it against Abnegation.
And at Erics fury over being fooled in this way.
She considers me a moment before asking. "Did you uncover anything?"
I don't bother looking to Falen who's chest stills as if he's holding his breath. He leans against Max's desk, behind the monitor that displays Jeanine. His hands curled around the edge of it, one foot crossed over the other.
He looks relaxed but I could tell the moment I entered the room, by the tension in his shoulders and the muscles in his jaw, that he's just trying to appear calm.
"Yes, but nothing Falen would have overlooked." I answer before yawning into the sleeve of my jacket. My skin feels flushed, like a fever.
Jeanine's face falls, just a little as if she was expecting a different answer. "Your signal was interrupted, and went offline at-"
"I couldn't have known." I answer with a shrug. "I did fall into the river, however." I lie easily, though I don't know to what effect the temperature of my body would have on the device, it seemed a believable enough excuse.
The fact that she did not ask why I was so near Erudite, is not lost to me. Would they have been watching me so closely, so soon after they thought I'd proven my loyalty? Or was she only alerted to my sudden disappearing vital signs?
Max explodes with laughter, and Falen cracks a smile, relaxing visibly from the corner of my eye. I know that Gav cannot keep quiet about his loss of clothing, and I am still wearing the loose and baggy garments.
"Well, we will have it replaced then, for the duration of choosing and initiations." Jeanine says simply, looking down from the monitor to the contents on her desk, I hear the shifting of papers but before she can question me further Max stands, and straightens his jacket.
"That's all Gene, you're dismissed for now… You're required again at 6 this evening, we've got a lot to cover." He pauses, a wide grin breaking over his face. "Besides, you look like you could use a good shower before then."
Eric steps into the bathroom and immediately the space feels too small. Too tight and too cramped. There's only one exit and his bulk blocks it.
He stares at me from the doorway, tilting his head to the side, his hands clasped patiently in front of him but I can see the way his knuckles stretch and glow white. "Gene."
My name comes as if spoken through only his teeth.
"Eric." I reply immediately, standing to the sink to pour out the murky brown water and bleach from the bucket I'd been using to clean.
The chemical smell burns my throat with every inhalation, but it does little to mask the rawness and lingering taste of bile in my mouth.
He gives a disappointed tsk sound, taking a step behind me. I try not to flinch at his nearness as his fingers brush the side of my waist close to the injury at my abdomen.
"I expected you this morning." His fingers curl slowly around my hip, barely reaching the edge of my fresh bandage. I avoid looking at him in the mirror, focusing on the filling bucket but I feel the nearnes of his breath on my back.
I know his intentions with Jade were in retaliation to my insubordintion. Another way for him to show how easily he can manipulate those around me.
The muscles along my neck and back ripple from the soft touch of his exhales, I grab the edges of the bucket to keep my hands from shaking. Wanting desperately, to be wrapped around his neck.
"Something came up." I answer without inflection. Pleased with the hold I have on my composure.
Obviously, he would know what his actions had wrought. He'd intentionally planted the thought that I had left, and abandoned her as she thought Kat did. He preyed upon her weakness of abandonement and lonliness.
He leans in too close, enough for me to smell his breath through his smile and my hands slip, sloshing water over the counter and onto the floor at our boots.
I turn but before I can react he grabs a towel and takes my arm in his, drying it. Patting my wrist down to my elbow. His eyes a dark liquid gray, watching his work.
I try not to blink; I try not to show any reaction at all even though my fingers begin to tingle and my blood seems to hum with anger and restraint of it.
He tosses the towel back to the counter and leans on it, his arm circling me. He's too close, there's not enough space and I can't breathe, can't even think while trying to control the violence writhing in my gut.
A constant pain, scratching, gnawing and tearing.
The sounds of the water still running come back to me, I turn back around and cut the faucet off, pouring some out of the overflowing bucket once more, trying to appear calm and deliberate as he trails his fingers up my spine.
"When I tell you to be somewhere, I expect you to be there." I can hear the threat in his voice as it brushes the skin of my cheek. "Otherwise why would I even say anything in the first fucking place?"
His hand snakes into my hair gently. I turn my head away, and his hand twists my hair to force my face back to his as he presses his nose and lips against my jaw softly.
When I open my mouth to argue he 'shushes' me, tilting my head so that my ear and neck are under his gaze.
I clench the muscles in my jaw so hard my teeth could break and I feel each exhale of his breath as his lips flutter along my hairline, tracing the curve of my ear, slowly till he reaches the device, grazing his lips over it.
Then he releases my hair and forces me around to face him, holding the back of my neck, pausing for a moment with his mouth over mine, his breath moist on my face and the light gleaming in his eyes.
The anger and resentment becomes too much to contain, my mind practically screams at me for aggression.
"You think I didnt know you were meant to distract me from the very begining?" I ask harshly. "Did you not think that you and I were meant to distract each other?"
I place my hand on the arm he has rested on the counter when he begins to raise it, stopping him, feeling his muscle tense beneath my touch, eager to claw into them. His grip on my hair means he can't stop me from speaking. "Did you not consider that I would put myself exactly where I wanted to be, with them, using you?"
He glares, his face becomes a scowl and he opens his mouth, I continue before he can say anything, grasping at the collar of his jacket to pull him in with my other hand.
"Don't forget your purpose, stop fucking with me while I fulfill mine."
I press my lips into his with force before he can punish me, or retaliate. Spots explode behind my eyelids and I clutch at his jacket with ferocity, letting the darkness envelope my senses.
He's stunned at first, there is a second before his head tilts to the side and he pushes harder against my mouth in return, his fingers snaking into my hair, digging into my scalp and his other arm wrapping around my waist, pulling me closer. Tighter. Crushing me.
Pure burning heat radiates off him when he opens his mouth as if to devour me and he is met by my own teeth and tongue. Suddenly there's such urgency-such a ravenous hunger-born of a need to release violence.
Just as I think it will consume me completely he shoves himself away from me, leaving the bathroom as if he hadn't just been there. I hear my door slam.
I open my eyes too late to see it happen. The sudden emptiness in my hands, unsure of what to do with them, felt, I wonder at it, possibly like the sting of rejection but so too relief.
I touch my mouth, my raw lips with a trembling hand, just like before it is fleeting, a new sensation but like before its sudden absence is felt more greatly.
The cold water stings every inch of my burning skin, and I tilt my face up against the spray of the shower head. The tile beneath my feet is smooth but uneven, in comparison to the tile beneath the palm of my hand that's pressed against the wall.
I blink against the frigid drops that blind my eyes and stream down my cheeks, running over my body.
Just a physical form made up of a skeleton, sewn up with muscle, sinew, nerves and flesh over each bone, that creates our existence that takes up space in the world.
Such an impact just existing can make, and then we move, breathe, see, touch, feel and the world goes to shit as a result.
I feel slightly uncomfortable and raw inside. My wound a pain that I feel with every pulse, fluctuating in intensity.
My wrists are bruising and tender and my throat is in the same condition. I drop my soaked bandage to the floor with a wet heavy slap.
A thought comes to mind. Katherine had said once, that men can be easily pacified, but I'm still not sure if that applies to Eric.
It would be far easier to kill him, even now he must still suspect me of duplicity and denying me the idea that I could've fooled him in that way. In any way.
Such is the nature of his games, that place him a step ahead, far enough to appear reachable. A game where all the players want the same thing, but must factor in my interference in order to make their moves.
I would have to do the same.
My fingers touch my lips again though and I think at how his kiss and his hands were insistent and eager but different, as if were the one with some power.
She throws her arms wide and he reaches for her, grabbing her around the waist, lifting her in a circle so that her legs kick in the air.
I watch as he stumbles under her, losing his balance, and they fall into a thick patch of grass, her landing on top of him with her body pressed against his.
Their laughter is muted to my ears though their faces are alight with it, open smiling mouths, flushed cheeks. Their eyes shining, but pitch black.
I watch her lean over him, orange hair falling over her shoulder, skirting the edges of his jaw. Him reaching up to tuck it behind her ear. His fingers touching her cheek, as she lowers to place her mouth to his.
I can't hear the words he speaks, as they're murmured into her ears, but I can see his lips moving with the grass, curving with the breeze, the clouds above go by with every open and close of his mouth.
And yet, the world stays silent and hushed. A sound I cannot hear. Would not recognize even.
A cold brushes against my hand, fingertips touch on my back, on my shoulders, curling around my arms. Whispering. Tugging me, backwards. Away.
I take a step forward and a twig snaps beneath my boot, the sound, like that of a bone breaking.
They twist their heads to look at me, their dark eyes widening as prey do, when they realize they are being hunted.
I am hunting them.
I'd not meant to fall asleep, but exhaustion had taken hold after my shower.
It's difficult to tell how much time passes as I lay there, staring at the ceiling, trying as I might to spot particles in the air. It feels as though I'd only just closed my eyes moments ago.
I count my breaths slow and sure, weaving them into the beat of my heart and the urging of my body to relax. The remnants of my dream still coursing through me like adrenaline, though my body is a lead weight.
When I check the time it's 527pm.
I lift my shirt and check my wound, it does not look as bad as it feels. The stitches still hold and the flesh has finally begun knitting together.
I lay there a bit longer, remembering that I had meant to learn from Lauren today, and to also check up on Jade again, that I would be called upon soon.
Almost an entire day wasted. I prop myself up onto an elbow and roll onto my stomach ignoring the painful pressure. Grabbing my tablet and the note.
First I run a systems diagnostic, satisfied when it runs its course I pick up the note.
Note is not an accurate word, as my fingers brush against the fuzzed edge where it was torn from another paper.
P.S. For Gene's eyes ONLY
You know where to find me. Xoxo. Katherine.
I do. I tear the paper into as small of pieces as I can and place them bit by bit in my mouth.